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First year teaching, recap of the first 8 weeks

For the past 7 weeks I have recapped my experience as a first year teacher on Facebook. I have received a lot of positive feedback so I decided to move my posts to my blog. I will pick up at week 8 and an entry about week 9 will be posted no later than Sunday, October 9th!

–> Recap of Week 8: I picked up a new name. It’s Ms. Mean Anderson, but I think “#TeamPetty” is still my favorite one lol. Let’s be clear. I am not purposely mean to my students, but I don’t take any crap either. My expectations for them are set high and I will NOT tolerate disrespect. Sometimes I have to get on their level so they have a CLEAR understanding that I. AM. NOT. HAVING. IT. I think slowly but surely they are realizing that I genuinely want them to succeed. I had a few students come to my first tutoring session and we had a great time. I love tutoring because it gives me an opportunity to further develop my relationships with my students and give them that additional one-on-one time that seems almost impossible to do during class time ( I’m still struggling with time management). Honestly, I feel like I’m still struggling with everything lmbo, but my administration and team swears I’m doing a great job (Thanks for the compliments guys 🙂 ).

–>Working in the inner city is hard. It’s just so many factors that contribute to the students’ success/failure. I understand why some people would rather be in the suburbs. But like I said at the very beginning, I have to be somewhere that I feel like I can make a difference. But Jesus, I didn’t think it would be THIS hard lol. Surprisingly, I haven’t cried yet. Besides having a great admin team and colleagues, reminding myself daily of the long-term goals really keeps me in the fight. I can’t wait to see what the community, school, and students are like in 2-3 years. AND my personal support system. I call someone at least once a week to decompress. ANNNND lol writing about my experience is also calming and gives me a chance to self reflect.

–> The Pom-Pom Squad. Lord they were driving me crazy, but now I might actually like them -_- lol. One swears her little face just brightens up my day.I promise she comes on the hall just to harass me. I am excited for their first performance because they have been working extremely hard. I slick am ready to brag like “Yeah, those are my girls. Yall can’t sit with use lmbo.”